Youngsters interested in Next Step Fair

Over five hundred colleges, institutes and schools, together with potential workplaces and service organisations, were introduced to youngsters in Finland at the Next Step Fair during January and February of this year. The Fair was organised in two separate locations, one in the city of Kuopio in north-eastern Finland, and the other on the southern coast, in the city of Turku. The Fair attracted a total of some 40,000 comprehensive school pupils and vocational trainees.

The purpose of the Next Step Fair was to offer teenagers information and guidance for their assistance in deciding which vocation they would like to pursue once they have left comprehensive school.

In addition to its vocational guidance content, the Fair offered a varied programme of cultural events. The main Presidential Candidates, Ms Tarja Halonen and Mr Esko Aho appeared at the Fair at a question and answer session. Tarja Halonen received the youngsters' approval when she announced that she would not be prepared to wear real fur.

The Fair was organised by the Finnish Federation of Vocational Trainees - SAKKI, which as an organisation represents the interests of students and trainees in vocational schools, institutes and colleges. At the Fair, the Chair of the Federation, Ms Pirjo Väänänen, voiced her concern about the low level of student grants. Vocational trainees are at present frequently obliged to finance their studies by means of bank loans or their parents financial support or by working during term times, as the student grant does not cover living expenses, Pirjo Väänänen said.

Increase in number of local level Agreements

Working hours and pay, together with other employment contract terms, are increasingly often negotiated at a company level in Finland. The results of a survey conducted at the University of Turku show that in 90 per cent of companies some terms which are connected with employment had been, at one time or another, agreed upon by the employer and the employees. The terms which deal with flexitime are those most commonly agreed at a company level.

Local level agreements are more common in large industrial companies than in the service sector workplaces.

Both the employers and the employees are of the opinion that local level agreements are useful. Company specific agreements have led to improved productivity, greater profitability, more work motivation and a better atmosphere at the workplace.

Only one third of the representatives of the employees feel that sufficient equality prevails amongst the negotiators at company level, whilst most employers find no discrepancy in equality. A majority of employers would like to widen the scope of local level bargaining, but most employees prefer the current system.

National, sectoral collective agreements contain terms which allow companies to agree, upon for example working hours, which differ from the collective agreement. If consensus cannot be reached at company level, the collective agreement will apply.

At company level negotiations, the employees are represented by shop stewards.

Revision of Basic Labour Law

The basic labour law in Finland, the Contracts of Employment Act, will be revised. It is expected that the Law Revision Committee, which has presided over the subject, will present proposals for several changes to be made. The most important issue will be the definition of a generally binding agreement. It has been proposed that a national collective agreement would also bind employers who are not members of any employers' federation, should the agreement be deemed to be representative and cover at least fifty per cent of all employees in the relevant sector.

Another significant revision to the law refers to temporary agency workers. This would mean that the temporary agency worker would, in every post, be subject to the collective agreement which has been negotiated for the sector of industry in which they were working. To date, no collective agreements have been applied to temporary agency workers and they have been subject to the minimum terms and conditions that are stipulated in law.

In addition, there is expectation of the insertion of a clause, which will prohibit the use of consecutive short term contracts without a valid reason.

The organisations of both employees and employers disagree with some of the proposed changes to the law.

European Social Fund support for jobs and training

Finland and the EU Commission have agreed upon the European Social Fund Target 3 Programme, with a total budget of nearly nine billion Finnish marks spanning a period of seven years. The EU will contribute 2.4 billion Finnish marks to this budget. It is hoped that the Programme will provide employment or training to 250,000 people in Finland.

The European Social Fund Target 3 Programme is essentially a development programme, which has the aim of finding, testing and producing new solutions and practices to be applied to the labour market and training policies in Finland.

Product development will be undertaken, with the aims of keeping an ageing workforce in employment, breaking the pattern of gender-based job allocation, the prevention of unemployment and marginalisation, and of developing vocational training models which will reflect the world of work.

Employment policy associated product development in Finland is of a leading world class. Only Sweden spends more money than Finland on high technology and product development research. Three per cent of the annual domestic gross product is allocated for this purpose in Finland.

The Finns hold the female boss in high esteem

Gender equality has become a trademark of Finland and, apart from having elected a woman to be the next President of the Republic, the Finns like working for a female boss. Recent statistics show that one in three Finns has a woman as their immediate superior at work. In this respect Finland is the gold medal holder in the EU countries.

Sweden, Denmark and the UK are trying hard to overtake Finland's lead. In the rest of the EU countries women have climbed the career ladder at a significantly slower pace.

Furthermore, female bosses are liked. People who have a female superior say that a woman is more encouraging and stimulating as a boss and she trusts her subordinates to a greater extent than does a man in a similar position. The statistics gathered in Finland also indicate that neither female nor male bosses are prone to either thanking or praising the workforce.

Nevertheless, there are just as few female managing directors, or women in high positions, in the public sector in Finland as anywhere else in Europe.

The Finnish workforce in total consists of an almost equal number of men and women. The women have better qualifications than the men and more than half of all women think that their work and career is important in their life, alongside their family.